Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
A business is like an automobile; it has to be driven in order to get results. - B. C. Forbes Automotive dealerships peered into the chasm in 2009 only to recover in 2010 and face a new decade with a restored sense of optimism and expectation. Even though some historical marques as Pontiac and Mercury failed to survive the cataclysm, competition among dealerships is as intense as it has ever been due to refreshed models and new technologies restoring the flow of customers into both new and used showrooms across the country. In this crowded arena, the automotive dealership owner or manager needs to harness every aspect of online technology to gain a competitive edge. No longer is it sufficient to just place a newspaper ad and move cars off the lot, as your customers are now involved in a sphere of mobile email communication and social media interaction that simply did not exist a few years ago. Email marketing has become obligatory for automotive and motorcycle dealerships large and small. Whether you operate a large urban multiple-brand dealership stretching over acres or if you have a tiny used car lot, there is no escaping the fact that email promotional campaigns are your most cost effective marketing vector. The primary reason for this remarkable effectiveness is the unparalleled return on investment of email marketing. According to a study by the Direct Marketing Association in 2009, email marketing returned $43.62 for every $1 invested: a rate far above any other form of marketing. The research included in this guide shows that automotive dealerships can benefit much further from comprehensive implementation of email marketing strategies than most currently do. It is confounding to learn that the typical dealership has email addresses for only one tenth of its customers, and that they do not reply to one quarter of all incoming email leads! This is especially surprising given that emails from automotive dealerships and social networking tools were the primary sources of information for more than seven out of every ten motor vehicle buyers. It is imperative that every automotive and motorcycle dealer in the nation becomes fully aware of the unquestionable advantages that email marketing offers to their business in this social media age. Email marketing can drive sales to your dealership with unparalleled economy and efficiency, thus it is the time to explore its capabilities in extensive detail. - Curt Keller CEO Benchmark Email
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
Introduction
This guide, Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales, was commissioned to provide automotive dealers with a strategy to increase the power and reach of their email marketing campaigns via: A comprehension of the disparate elements that can be harmonized into a singular and effective automotive dealership marketing campaign Establishing and maintaining a campaign that strictly adheres to all federal, state, and industry legislative and selfregulatory standards Understanding the facts and figures for successful and competitive automotive dealerships, and those which fail Optimization of email marketing results by crafting a solution that is both unique and custom-tailored to your automotive dealership The data in this guide is correlated from recently published major statistical studies; information derived from the owners and managers of automotive and motorcycle dealerships located in the USA and Canada ranges from independent used car lots to major urban multiple brand dealers. The data was distilled from this effort to be integrated into the Automotive Dealership Email Marketing Survey section. This paper raises a series of questions about the current status of the email marketing campaigns of automotive dealerships and provides solutions that can help drive sales from both new and existing motoring customers. A perspective on the present state of automotive and motorcycle dealership email campaigns is gained through an analysis of their performance metrics; factual strategies contained herein will advance the state of this industrys appeal to the motoring consumer.
Background
The traditional image of auto-dealerships largely reliant on the same traditional marketing methods that were popular when cars had tail fins is not too far off the mark in todays emphatically electronic world. Many dealerships still rely heavily on newspapers, television and radio advertising, which can be prohibitively expensive and brings in fewer customers every year. In the last four years alone, newspaper ad revenue dropped by 44.24%. The savvy automotive dealership manager must question the rationale of continuing to invest heavily in a medium that nearly half of all advertisers have already discarded. Local radio audience numbers have been ravaged by the proliferation of satellite and internet stations, as well as ubiquitous portable music players, to the point where both specific program and Run of Schedule buys are now largely ineffective. According to Arbitron, AQH Share and Cume, numbers are now a shadow of what they were even a decade ago. Television advertising is faring much worse than most people assume: Garth Ancier, the head of BBC Worldwide America, states that his studies have shown that 50 percent of his networks watchers are viewing on their DVRs and a staggering 97 percent of them are skipping the advertising content. The transition of automotive customers to online communications has been accentuated by the rapidly expanding adoption of mobile web-enabled devices such as smartphones. A Jacobs Media study on the use of smartphones concluded that most respondents increasingly use their smartphones for an increased array of functions and, as a result, there appears to be a drop-off in the use of other devices including car radios. The study also claimed a greater degree of responsiveness in the form of returned email messages among smartphone users, and listed email as the first in a list of the 11 most used functions on the mobile devices.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
A market trend as significant as the explosion in smartphone use is the migration of a massive number of online users to social networks. Facebook alone boasts 700 million users, which is double the entire population of the United States. Social media has swiftly grown to become an unparalleled facilitator to any online marketer. According to Gartner Research, up to 74 percent of the population relies on social networks to guide purchase decisions. This trend is especially powerful when applied to automobile purchasers, which traditionally are the second-largest purchase any family makes, directly after real estate. The automotive dealerships that are able to strategically position and execute their email marketing campaigns find that in many cases it can be their most effective advertising or promotional method. These successful dealerships find that email address collection is a priority and they are able to fulfill this requirement through a variety of means: In the showroom At the service counter At the parts counter At car shows At racing events At concert events Through parades and other municipal & social events Via their website signup page As a pre-requisite to test drives From the franchising manufacturer Many of the smaller and independent used vehicle sellers that make up the majority of actual automotive dealership businesses do not engage in email marketing at the current time, thus leaving the market to be amply reached by just a minority of dealerships that tend to be larger and are franchised to engage in new car sales.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
independent used vehicle business is still essentially being conducted without the assistance of online technological advantages and the concurrent promotional benefits.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
base. If the numbers are extrapolated to the Gartner Research findings, these dealerships are potentially losing out on over 66.5% of social medias effectiveness in driving the purchase decision to buy a car. When that staggering statistic is combined with the finding in the Cobalt Groups National Automotive eShopper Experience Study (which revealed that dealers do not respond in any way to fully 25% of all email generated leads and of the ones who do, 30% never follow up) it can be concluded that the current state of many dealerships email marketing leaves much to be desired. Of the dealers surveyed in the Cobalt study, only 46.2% replied to an email within an hour, with the majority leaving the email reply for much later. A great number of these emails were rather scant in the important details that the consumer seeks. 63.8% did not quote a price of any kind, 56.2% did not address availability of the desired vehicle, and 87% did not provide any information as to the value of the brand or the vehicle they were interested in. 23% of all customers that switched brands claimed poor dealer interaction for their decision, thus it can be concluded that lack of proper and thorough responsiveness to email queries is primarily to blame for this considerable number of lost sales. Another Cobalt study, this one conducted in conjunction with web giant Yahoo!, found that emails from dealerships and social networking tools were the primary sources of information to 71% of individuals purchasing a motor vehicle. Local Automotive Dealerships: The Role Of Interactive Media In The Local Car Shopping Process8 also found that 23% of all visits to dealership websites were triggered through an email link. Receiving an email from the dealership was the number one action that convinced prospects to visit the showroom. Fully 59% of all motorists stated that it was the dealers email that got them to travel to the lot. It can be concluded from this data that email marketing is an exceptionally powerful and effective means of automotive dealership promotion, but it is imperative that the entire customer process be streamlined and facilitated to the nth degree in order to translate the greatest possible number of inquiries into sales. Dropping the ball by failing to reply or follow-up is costing a great number of automotive dealerships such a substantial percentage of sales that this factor alone could legitimately make the difference between a successful and a failing business.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
Implementation
A number of factors bear painstaking consideration when embarking on a new email marketing campaign strategy. Unlike many other forms of advertising where the worst that can happen is that no one bothers to visit your showroom, the improper implementation of an email campaign might precipitate a regrettable sequence of serious legal charges.
Compliance
What would otherwise be an innocuous action such as obtaining a customers business card in the showroom and later entering it into your email subscriber list can land your business in serious legal trouble with the federal government. You must have a record of each customers explicit permission to be placed on your subscription list, or you may face a series of serious penalties. Each and every facet of your email campaign must be audited to ensure absolute compliance with all automotive dealership industry self-regulatory standards as well as federal and state law.
Facilitate Unsubscription
If your motoring customer desires to leave your list, you must ensure that the unsubscribe process is fast, consistent, and precise. There is a myriad of guidelines that need to be strictly adhered to in order to make absolutely certain that every single unsubscribe request is honored quickly and accurately.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
Privacy Policy
Your privacy policy should be drafted by your dealerships attorney or legal team and never simply copied and pasted from another automotive sellers site. Failure to have a specifically applicable privacy policy can also trigger serious legal consequences.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
Email Metrics
Given the relative lack of sophistication evidenced in the implementations of email marketing campaigns by many dealerships, it seems that a considerable number of automotive dealerships need to be better acquainted with the statistical reports that allow you to obtain a perspective on the performance of your email campaign. The actual quanta of measurement are referred to as metrics, and include open rates and CTRs. These figures should be carefully tracked over time to allow a full perspective on the performance of your overall email marketing plan.
Benchmark as Your Automotive Dealerships Email Marketing Solution Give Your Email Campaign V-12 Power with Hybrid Economy
When you place Benchmark Email on your marketing team, your dealership will be in a position to zoom past the competition and ease your campaigns overhead. Benchmark Email is one of the leading email marketing service providers trusted by over 73,000 avid users, and their savvy professional experts have engineered an alluring and efficient system that was custom tailored to the needs of any automotive or motorcycle dealership, from the largest multi-brand full service dealer to the tiniest used car lot. This exclusive Automotive Dealership Email Marketing Solution is a fully proprietary set of synergistic online communications functions integrated into a powerful DIY system that utilizes a straightforward web browser interface to access a wealth of unparalleled email marketing features. Leveraging the best of email and social media marketing engagements, this system is fast, efficient, and easy to implement. Youll be able to launch a comprehensive campaign in just a few minutes.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
10
of online marketing professionals, ensuring that every aspect of your email campaign is in adherence to the full spectrum of legislative and self-regulative industry standards. Benchmark Email will manage up to two separate email marketing campaigns for you in their entirety. Additional campaigns are available at a slight extra cost. Their marketing specialists will ensure that every facet of your campaign meets with your full approval prior to sending any emails. The total subscriber management solution uploads and segments your list on your behalf, devises an online signup form to boost your subscriber list, and sets up autoresponders for timely responses to your customers. By setting up customer feedback channels, Benchmark Email will build an in-depth customer survey and create custom polls. Social media is among the most powerful of all online marketing channels, thus Benchmark Email will publish your newsletter links on your Twitter account and provide a broad range of effective social media services for you. Benchmark Emails monthly customized individual service covers every possible aspect of a powerful automotive dealership email and social media campaign, and it costs less than a single D2S headlight bulb! The advantages of this powerful approach are innumerable: Consider it as placing your email campaign on Cruise Control!
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
11
Expertise & Technology No other email service provider can surpass Benchmark Emails technological infrastructure. Benchmark facilitates thorough control over every aspect of your email campaign transmission and delivery. This technological command ensures that any form of email including plain text, HTML, and video will be securely delivered into your subscribers inbox. Full Tracking Reports Incorporating Visual Graphs - Benchmark Email features a series of comprehensive email tracking reports to provide you with all your campaigns results at a glance. Each statistical grouping is explained in simple language without having to resort to convoluted industry jargon, accentuated by clear visual graphs that allow you to easily understand the performance metrics included in the report. High Volume Plans Benchmark Email provides every size of automotive and motorcycle dealership with the most powerful and effective features and services, right down to the smallest used vehicle lots. Should your dealership be of such a size as to require over 150,000 emails per month, our high volume plans can provide the elevated performance suited to your high traffic requirements. Polls & Surveys - Benchmark Email features sophisticated surveying and polling methodologies that are easily ranked among the best email service providers. This set of exhaustive demographic polling tools allows you to sharpen the focus of your online promotional campaigns by monitoring the reactions and opinions of your motoring prospects. Benchmark Email can provide a special customized range of subscriber participation forms to assist your automotive dealership in achieving its marketing goals with finesse and effectiveness. Social Media Tools Automotive dealerships traditionally collect email addresses for their subscription lists face to face at the point of sale, at the parts and service counters, at car shows, trade shows, concerts, sports, or other live events. Many automotive dealerships are failing to properly leverage their social networking presences for subscription list building as much as they should. Benchmark Email specializes in the provision of social network integration on all major sites such as Twitter and Facebook. This social media strategy will ensure that your messages will be shared and Liked widely among the social connections of your subscribing customers. Templates Whatever your automotive dealerships promotional requirements, they can easily be met by one of hundreds of extremely specialized email templates provided by Benchmark Email. These templates are custom-tailored to accurately suit any dealerships promotional requirements. The coding and graphic experts at Benchmark Email can fit any of these templates to your needs and even design a fully original, personalized template for your use should you request it.
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
12
Drive-in car shows Fairs, concerts, sports & similar events Financing promotions Fleet sales presentations Government & institutional bids Holiday promotions Local & regional approaches Manufacturer brand co-ops Parts-specific offers Promoting word of mouth Referral enhancements Service-specific offers Shopping center presences Showroom-specific offers Team sponsorships Test drive incentives Trade show booths
Results
Among the positive bottom line results that automotive dealerships can benefit from when applying the comprehensive Benchmark Email Automotive Dealership package of services are: Cost / Benefit analysis Ease of information exchange Full service option provision Professional liaison Quick launch Scalability Sustainability
Discover How Your Automotive Dealership Can Benefit from Benchmark Emails Services
Both Benchmark Emails Automotive Dealership package and the We Do It for You services are specifically designed to take your email campaigns to the next level of reach and effectiveness. Benchmark Email is proud to offer a specialized custom-tailored campaign service for automotive dealerships that provides state of the art, award-winning features, unparalleled value, extreme affordability, and an implementation that is engineered specifically for your dealerships preferences and requirements. If you are ready to really reach for that checkered flag, take your email campaign off the hoist and onto the racetrack while enjoying the advantages of a fully optioned-out ride: Drive home Benchmark Emails exclusive Automotive Dealership Email Marketing Services. Put the pedal to the metal and let Benchmark Email show you how a sporty yet premium email campaign can really outperform!
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales 13
CONTACT US
Contact Benchmark
We welcome your feedback and would love to talk with you about your event marketing needs. Please contact us at the addresses below. Website: http://www.benchmarkemail.com/ Call: 800.430.4095 Email: sales@benchmarkemail.com
Free trial at www.BenchmarkEmail.com/register Automotive Dealership Marketing: Email Campaigns Driving Sales
14